It doesn’t matter if you have a busy, successful life in the city or the a quiet, communal life in the country, The Colony by Annika Norlin demonstrates how wrong both ways of living when they limit your horizons.
There is nothing romantic about The Colony. It doesn’t have any great answers. And it doesn’t offer any kind of ethos to ascribe to. It’s an engaging fictional perspective on human tendencies to curl up like a pill bug and let external forces push us around when life gets challenging. (Well, with the exception of one character who may or may not be a serial killer.)
Because the story doesn’t offer cohesive philosophy, many of the reviews treat it as semi-formed. But I think the book is honest and doesn’t overreach. It even tells you in the teaser that this is about questioning and disturbance — not a self-help road map for communal living.
Here’s the the book teaser:
Burnt-out from a demanding job and a bustling life in the city, Emelie has left town to spend a few days in the country. Once there, in the peaceful, verdant hills, down by the river she encounters a mysterious group of seven people, each with personal stories full of pain, alienation, and the longing to live differently. They are misfits, each in their own way, and all led by the enigmatic and charismatic Sara.
How did they end up there? Are they content with the rigid roles they’ve been assigned? And what happens when an outsider appears and is initially drawn to their alternative lifestyle but cannot help but stir things up?
The Colony does a great job of giving you just enough plot twists to make you want to follow the loose thread until the very end. At the final page, you may wonder if you — like the characters — spent too much time as a passive participant. But entrapping the reader in the various internal dialogues about victimhood, disenchantment, shame, and devolution that drive the plot is kind of what makes this such a clever bit of writing. And there is also just enough hope –for the most compelling characters who delicately embrace their wide open futures — that it delivers a satisfying ending.
I could not identify with any of the characters, even though I am also skilled at living more self-sufficient, rural, nature-based living. Yet, the forces that made that ragtag tribe stay together too long still seemed disturbingly relatable.
The concept of sunk costs — of having already paid too large a price to change direction – pervades. Everyone is so stuck in their own version of mental quicksand, they can’t see the giant, safety rope next to them. But haven’t we all been there? So, feeling sympathetic toward most of the characters came easy.
The prevailing theme that holding on too tight and too long to modes of living that no longer serve us well is a tale as old as time and isn’t unique to a specific place or type of person. And The Colony demonstrates clearly why living in rural isolation, with too few friends and limited outside experiences, when you know with certainty it has not led to personal growth or profound insights is unhealthy. But it also demonstrates why participating in our greater civil society, without cultural criticism and connection to nature, will equally lead to becoming a burnt out, desperately miserable person.
I would also note that there seems to be some literary homage to magical realism in bringing together this set of people in static isolation, forcing them to live together long-term with only occasional/mystical intervention from the outside world, and with no clear sense of time. I failed to recognize it until about half way through, so the premise sometimes seemed ridiculous and the storyline occasionally fell apart. But once I recognized this as a little Macondo, I got swept up in the compelling portrayal of how making people feel just slightly less excluded as members of narrow culture, can keep them in thrall past the point of rational decision-making.
As a reader, you are also kept in thrall, because the story unfolds in a kind of prismatic narrative spiraling that brings to light outsider/insider perspectives on the communal living members, and on Emelie (the undeclared acolyte). This device both narrows and broadens the subject matter in ways that bring the reader into direct contact with the most tedious and alluring aspects of the back to the land lifestyle, without becoming dull.
Incidentally, Sara and Emelie occupy more page time and hold undue influence over outcomes, but they don’t seem like real people. They are totems of two equally desperate identity types – the social follower who fancies themselves a social climber and the spiritual phony who thinks they are a guru. They are neon signs flashing the message: beware the bald-faced bear (unless you want to be eaten alive and mauled to death by your fragile ego).
Overall, the writing and plot, come across as authentic, accessible, thoughtful, and unique. And in contemplating it for those post, I realized I really needed this book, because my own ego has been a bit too fragile lately, with defensiveness being my bald faced bear. And I will do my best to turn away from that tendency going forward.
Leave a Reply